I don't feel quite right calling chess a waste of time but... Gameknot provides online chessplay for free. It's turn-based chess, the way people used to play by mail, in fact. You can setup a time between moves, and this could be several days. There's even an RSS feed to tell you when it's your turn. And if that's not enough, there's an IE toolbar to remind you. If chess isn't your bag, try out a Java versions of Lines or Reversi (because can you really have too many versions of those?). Really, if you're tired of playing a computer AI in your chess games though, this appears to be a solid alternative. Well, you could also go find a living human nearby, but who has the time?